Strangers

said.
        Ginger saw the shock of that news register with both Bennell and General Alvarado. They looked at each other in surprise, and then a light of hope lit both their faces.
        Alvarado said, "You're not telling us you found a way through the Depository's security? But that's not possible!"
        "Have you read the file on Jack?" Bennell asked his friend. "Yes? Well, just remember his Ranger training and what he's been doing for a living these past eight years or so."
        Jack shook his head. "I can't take all the credit. Yeah, I got us through the perimeter, across the grounds, and past the first door, but it was Dom who actually got us inside."
        "Dom?" Bennell said, turning in surprise to the writer. "But what do you know about security systems? Unless… of course! This strange damn power of yours! Since that experience in Lomack's house and since the light you generated when Cronin first arrived at the Tranquility, you must've discovered the power wasn't external. You must know now that it's actually in you."
        Ginger realized that Bennell's statement had revealed that their conversations at the Tranquility had, indeed, been monitored. But it also revealed that their discussions and strategy sessions in the diner, after Jack's arrival, had not been penetrated. Otherwise Bennell would have known about the experiment last night in which both Dom and Brendan had learned that their apparently mystical experiences were, in fact, events of their own creation.
        "Yes," Dom said. "We know the power's in us - me and Brendan. But where does it come from Doctor Bennell?"
        "You don't know?"
        "I think it has something to do with what happened to us when we went in the ship, but I can't remember. Can't you tell me?"
        "No," Miles Bennell said. "Not really. It was known that three of you went into the vessel, but we didn't know that anything… peculiar had happened to you in there. You'd come out just as the helicopters with DERO troops and scientific observers began to arrive on the site, and no one figured you'd been in there more than a couple minutes. When you were taken into custody, you didn't tell anyone that something important had happened while you'd been aboard. I believe you said you'd just looked around. And for ease of handling, you were all sedated immediately after being arrested and conveyed back to the Tranquility. So even if you'd changed your mind and decided to tell us what happened, you didn't have a chance." Excited, the lanky scientist absentmindedly began to comb his long fingers through his curly black beard as he talked. "When the decision was made to put a lid on the event, to brainwash every civilian who'd seen it, there wasn't time for a thorough debriefing of all the witnesses. In fact, you were never brought out of sedation; you were moved directly onto the drug program that was part of your memory-wipe. That's one reason I was opposed to the cover-up. I felt that by brainwashing you without giving us plenty of time to debrief… well, it was not only unfair and cruel to you but a really stupid waste of potential sources of data."
        Ginger looked toward the open portal farther along the flank of the vessel, at the top of the portable stairs. "If we go back inside now, maybe the last of the memory block will crumble."
        "That might help," Bennell agreed.
        Looking up at the starship again, Jack said, "How'd you know it was coming down out there along I-80?"
        "Yeah," Dom said. "And why'd they think it should be covered up?"
        "And the creatures who came in it," Jack said.
        "God, yes," Ginger said, "where are they? What's happened to them?"
        Interrupting, General Alvarado said, "Like Niles said, you'll get the answers because you deserve them. But first, there's more urgent business." He turned to Dom. "I suppose if you can levitate things and create light out of thin air, there's no problem getting through an electronic security system. And if you can get in, you ought to be able to use your power to keep other people out. You think you could? Keep both the blast doors and the smaller entrance from opening until we're ready to open them?"
        Dom was clearly as baffled by these questions as Ginger was. He said, "Well, maybe. I don't know."
        Bennell looked at the general. "Bob, if you keep the colonel out, that'll be like lighting the fuse. He knows no one can control